Update: I was unfortunately not aware of Shamus Young's severe criticism of Fallout 3 available here to link in the original piece and I regret that. It dovetails rather nicely with what I've written and it's much better executed than my piece. I strongly recommend anyone...

I have really given this game some time and I tried to forgive it. I rented this on Xbox 360 when it first came out and gave up after the second level. I bought this as a cheap Steam sale about a year ago and have just had it sitting on my HDD since then. I have gone back here and there to try to beat or continue this game. I just can't do it and have finally given up. After two years of giving this game a chance I doubt it will become better over time. The paper-thin story, poor stealth mechanics, and technical flaws just bring this promising game down.

You play as a British spy infiltrating Germany during World War II and other occupied territories for...I don't know really. The story is presented in flashbacks that don't really explain much other than why Violet is at that current location. You have various goals you have to complete, but there are enemies in between that you have to kill off or avoid. A stealth game has to have great stealth mechanics like sneaking, killing, and gadgets which Velvet fails in every category. First off, she moves way to slow when crouching. You can never catch up to enemies who are walking because they just leave her in the dust. This is extremely difficult when you are trying to quickly kill someone before you are spotted. The kill moves are pretty cool, but you have to be in the exact position the game needs you to be before you can trigger it. You also have to be extremely close which is ridiculous. This isn't Splinter Cell where you can trigger the kill at a reasonable distance.

You get a few items to help you kill these Nazis. You can use Morphine shots to become invisible, freeze time, and do an automatic kill. This is useful for a guard that has spotted so you can take him down really quick. You get a silenced pistol, but ammo is hard to come by so use it wisely. Some times you can also use a Nazi uniform as a disguise, but if you get too close to enemies they will recognize you. The game has shadow stealth which means if you hide in the shadows you will have a blue aura around you and enemies won't see you. This game has some of the dumbest enemy AI I have ever seen. You can whistle to lure a guard to some shadows but he won't see you even though you are two feet in front of him. If you are seen and try to hide the enemies know exactly where you are and you can't hide from them. What kind of lame crap is that?

The game looks good and has a nice visual art style, but there are some technical flaws here. Animations are pretty bad with some terrible sound effects. The footsteps all sounds the same and the animations just seems floaty and canned. I also found some of the guards patrols to be very long and the overall patterns are hard to work around. It's difficult to figure out how to take out enemies because there are no natural hints or obvious paths most of the time.

Overall, Velvet Assassin was a promising stealth action game set in World War II but has a pointless story, broken stealth mechanics, and some technical flaws. The game looks good, but other than that there is no reason for you to pick this up. Rent this if you want to play a stealth game with a sexy protagonist, otherwise look elsewhere.